Tennis gets the Iga Swiatek vs. Aryna Sabalenka showdown the WTA Tour craved

New York Times

2 days ago

ROLAND GARROS, PARIS — Iga Świątek and Aryna Sabalenka, the most successful women's tennis players of this decade, will meet in the French Open semifinals Thursday in what is only their second meeting at a Grand Slam, and their first anywhere in 10 months.
Both were straight-sets winners in their quarterfinal matches Tuesday, with Świątek beating Ukraine's Elina Svitolina 6-1, 7-5 after Sabalenka, the world No. 1, got past Zheng Qinwen, who won Olympic gold on these courts last year, 7-6(3), 6-3.
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It'll be the first time the two have met at a major since the 2022 U.S. Open, which was before Sabalenka won her first one. She has since won three, moving her to within two of Świątek's total of five. Four of those have come at Roland Garros, including all of the last three. Their last meeting, in Cincinnati last August, was a one-sided win for Sabalenka, but their meeting at the Madrid Open three months earlier was the best women's match of 2024.
Świątek ended up winning a barnstorming final 7-5, 4-6, 7-6(7), saving three championship points in a pulsating contest that lasted more than three hours.
Świątek and Sabalenka are the only two world No. 1s since April 2022, with the former holding the top spot for 125 weeks compared to her rival's 41, but it's the Belarusian who has been at the top of the rankings since last October. Świątek is currently down at No. 5 having not won a title since last year's French Open, but those four Roland Garros titles are a reminder that beating her here is one of the toughest tasks in tennis.
Svitolina found that out Tuesday, playing at close to her best level for long stretches of the match but ultimately succumbing in straight sets. That tends to be the way of things with Świątek's wins here. Sunday's thrilling win over Elena Rybakina, another heavyweight opponent Świątek has played too rarely at majors, was an exception — her semifinal against Sabalenka ought to be also.
Sabalenka had to dig deep to reach the semis, edging past Zheng, the No. 8 seed, who led by a break in the first set and was every bit her equal in the opening exchanges. Pinching the first set on a tie-break after 73 minutes was critical, giving the Sabalenka the platform to then overwhelm her opponent in the second set.
Poor officiating threatened to overshadow the match at a critical juncture in the first set. With Sabalenka serving at 5-6, 30-30, she hit a backhand that looked to have drifted long — so much so that Zheng stopped the point, despite there being no out call.
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Unlike at the combined ATP and WTA events on clay and every other surface, including the other three Grand Slams, the French Open doesn't use electronic line calling (ELC) and instead relies on line judges. The chair umpire also inspects ball marks as a back-up.
On this occasion, the umpire got off her chair to inspect the mark, and backed up the line judge's call, but television replays using Hawk-Eye technology showed that the ball had actually been 7mm out. ELC has a margin of error, but it is smaller than 7mm. The French Tennis Federation (FFT) president Gilles Moretton said last week that Roland Garros was resisting ELC because of the country's world-leading officials, but given the speed at which Sabalenka's ball was traveling, it should have been relatively easy for the line judge to track. Zheng was able to hold her serve with a ripping backhand pass down the line, so the incorrect call didn't have a material impact on the match, but it's an embarrassing look for the sport that such a critical call at a Grand Slam could have been botched like that.
There were a couple of further wrong calls that were at least correctly overruled by the umpire. The FFT did not respond to a request for comment on the officiating errors from the match.
The blockbuster semifinal between Świątek and Sabalenka is the most exciting match in either draw so far, in a tournament that has been overshadowed by the women once again continually being denied the most prominent court allocations. For the second successive year, no women's matches have been scheduled in the night session, and on every day it's been a women's match opening up Court Phillipe-Chatrier — a slot when the stadium is at its least full and often more than half-empty.
That was the case for Sabalenka's match against Zheng, which started at 11 a.m. local time and was pretty much empty in the lower tiers for the duration. 'It was a big match and probably would make more sense to put us a little bit later just so more people could watch it,' Sabalenka said in a news conference afterwards.
'I definitely think that would make more sense to kind of like move our match for a little bit later.'
Sabalenka added her voice to leading players like Świątek, Coco Gauff, Madison Keys and Jessica Pegula, who have questioned why women have never been given the primetime night slot on Chatrier. Tournament director Amélie Mauresmo's justification is that men's matches are longer and so offer spectators better value for money.
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'I definitely have to say that we deserve the equal treatment,' Sabalenka said. 'There was a lot of great battles, a lot of great matches, which would be cool to see as, like, night session, just more people in the stands watching these incredible battles. And just to show ourselves to more people.
'So, yeah, I definitely agree that we deserve to be put in a bigger stage, you know, like better timing, more people watching.'
Thursday afternoon's match will nevertheless see the defining women's players of the past few years go head to head on one of the biggest stages of all. 'She has a game for every surface,' Świątek said in her on-court interview of her great rival and next opponent.
'I need to focus on myself, do the work, be brave in my shots and just go for it. For sure it's going to be a tough match. I'm happy for a challenge.'
'I love those challenges,' Sabalenka said. 'And I'm always excited to face someone strong and someone who can challenge me … I go out there and I fight, and I'm ready to leave everything I have to get the win.'
(Top photos: Getty Images)